The Harlequin (Anita Blake Book 15)

I don't think it's unfair to say that when I discovered Laurell K. Hamilton in high school, I was at just the right age and maturity level to appreciate her work. Anyone who reads the current incarnations of Hamilton's work, specifically the later Anita Blake novels, and the whole Merry Gentry series, would probably find such a statement a bit shocking. As time has passed, Hamilton's works have gone from being fun paranormal mysteries, with high tension romance, and some smatterings of Harlequin (no pun intended in this specific review) sex scenes, but nothing too overboard. . .

Looking back, I recall that the first novel in the Anita Blake series, my beloved Guilty Pleasures, had naught but one single kiss in its pages. The necromancer, zombie raising, vampire executioner heroine didn't even have sex with anyone until probably book 4 or 5. Instead Hamilton focused on crimes, and mysteries, and the books were hella fun to read. Then, some time following Obsidian Butterfly (my first encounter with the series, but the 9th actual book in the series) something began to change.

Anita got a little. . . slutty.

But dedicated as I was, I kept right on reading, I even bought several of the books in hardcover because I wanted to know so badly how things would progress. And sadly, they progressed poorly. By book 14, Danse Macabre, I was getting more than a little annoyed with Hamilton and her over-sexualized series. So much so, that I said enough was enough, and swore to never venture into the series ever again.

Then people began to tell me "no, Ashley, we swear, it's gotten better." I scoffed and argued that Danse Macabre's actual plot could have been compressed into 2 chapters of the 50 chapter novel. The remaining 48 chapters had been largely smut, and most of the prose therein was overwhelmingly purple. But they kept insisting, and so I caved. I coughed up $9 and bought book 15, The Harlequin, in paperback.

And you know what? It wasn't bad. It was at least 1/3 into the book before ANYONE had sex. It by no means lived up to the expectations set by the original Blake novels (I suggest reading books 1-9 and then stopping, or venture forth at your own risk). There was, however, one thing that bothered me INTENSELY.

With about 1/4 left in the book, just prior to the confrontation with the novel's "big bad" (to borrow a Buffy phrase), Hamilton suddenly and without warning, changes the name of her villainess from Mercia to Columbine. Not only does it demonstrate poor editing, but for such an error to pass from hardcover into paperback just seems sloppy. Worse, still? It's not the first time it's happened. In Blue Moon (Book 8) she makes a similar error, changing a character's name from Betsy to Betty. It is a frustrating and jarring error. However, I was willing to forgive it somewhat because of Hamilton's return to focus on plot over porn.

Hopefully Book 16, which I refuse to buy in hardcover, will carry on the trend.

**.5 out of *****
2.5 out of 5

Sunday Picks

Reading: Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol

Hearing: Weezer's Blue Album

Watching: Nothing, currently.

Necklace of Kisses

"It's been so extraordinary," said Weetzie. "And I never use that word! Like a magical-realist book or a Fellini movie. I haven't this way in about ten years."

One of the remarkable things about reading almost any Francesca Lia Block novel is the way she is able to make Los Angeles and the Hollywood Hills seem to appear as a place of genuine magic. In spite of what we tend to know better, about smog and violence, pollution and a typically unromantic city, Block is able to make it beautiful.

The book is sequel of sorts of Block's Dangerous Angels series, featuring the punk-rock pixie Weetzie Bat and her diverse cast of friends, lovers and children. Weetzie, as heroine's go, is well meaning and kind. She is simple and self-involved the way most romantic heroine's are: her world is the only thing she needs to know about. But in Necklace of Kisses the world which she has carefully constructed is forced to confront reality. Her boyfriend of 20 years, Max, has spent the two years following September 11, 2001 in a deep funk, and it has literally drained their relationship of joy, love, and kisses. So Weetzie packs the essentials, thinking "what would Audrey [Hepburn] do?" and heads off to a pink hotel in search of her missing kisses. She is chasing a prom night memory, and isn't sure herself what she expects to find.

What does happen is possibly one of the first meta-magic-realism novels I've ever read. In her quest for discovery Weetzie meets a mermaid who has made herself into a Pamela Anderson look-a-like, she meets a fairy, a faun (named Pan, no less), an angel, a spider-woman, a genie and twelve dancing princesses. Many of the characters she meets are manifestations of references that Weetzie herself has made in previous chapters, and almost all of them are exactly what you expect them to be. With each kiss, Weetzie collects a physical gemstone (hence the title). There are very few surprises in Necklace of Kisses, but it doesn't make the book bad.

Necklace of Kisses is far from a perfect book. It is charming and sweet, and takes full advantage of the senses, like any good magic realism novel should. But Weetzie's own awareness of the magic realism aspects of the story in which she is involved are overwhelming, and almost make it not magic realism at all. The entire point of magic realism is that extraordinary things occur, and do not seem so impossible. By the end, Weetzie is resolved to the magic, however.

The book is an easy read, and is both fun and visceral. However a better option for those unfamiliar with Block's work would be to start with Dangerous Angels.

***.5 of *****
3.5 out of 5

Garden Spells

"Like every person who had ever fallen in love, Tyler Hughes wondered what the hell was wrong with him."

I had every intention of at least waiting a day before writing this review.  I just finished the book 15 minutes ago, and being that it is 3:30 in the morning it seems like a relatively crazy time to write a review, but I simply can't wait.

I'm afraid if I keep choosing my own book selections to read and review, we're going to have some difficulty coming up with negative reviews for this blog.  However, I am mightily proud of myself for finishing two books less than a week into the year.

I felt really apprehensive about this book in the first few pages.  From the description, and the expository detail, my skin prickled and my brain shouted "Practical Magic!"  Yes, Garden Spells shares an eerily similar premise to the Alice Hoffman novel/Sandra Bullock film (I will admit, I have not read Hoffman's novel, so I only have the film to base my comparison on).  The story centers on Claire Waverley, a mysterious and solitary woman who lives in a small Southern town and makes her living off of making food (with a specialty in edible flowers) that is known to make things. . . happen.  Furthermore, the aged apple tree in her back yard allegedly shows someone the most important event of their life after consuming one of the apples.  Waverley women are understood to be magical, and while their gifts are coveted, they themselves are not embraced by the town as a whole.

Claire's sister Sydney chose to escape from the small town scrutiny and left when she was eighteen, only to return 10 years later with a daughter, Bay, after escaping an abusive relationship.  

A story about magical sisters in a small town, sharing a big old house?  That's about where the parallels to Practical Magic end.  The women in Garden Spells are not witches.  The word is never even used once in the book.  They are merely women blessed with peculiar gifts, who learn with age how best to wield them.  The novel itself, is a lovely investigation of the human condition, entwined in a story full of magic realism.  The Waverley's apple tree is a character unto itself, hurling apples for attention, or dropping them in neighbours yards, delivering the unexpected invitation of "eat me" without ever speaking a word.

It is a book about life, told beautifully.  A story about the ability people have to both hold onto, and also release their most private hurts.  It's a story about healing, growing, compassion, and most importantly, it is a love story.  It manages to be a love story in the classic sense, illustrated in the dynamic between the chronic bachelorette Claire and her enticing new neighbour Tyler Hughes, a local art professor.   It is a love story also, about the bonds of family.  Whether it is Claire and Sydney's deep affections for their elderly relative Evanelle (whose Waverley gift is to deliver mysterious presents to people, whose purpose is revealed much later), or the growing bond between Claire and Sydney themselves.  Separated for a decade, and never close before that, the two sisters learn about their connection anew when Sydney reappears in Claire's life.  And lastly, it is a love story about self.  It is about learning to let go, and trust what was always there, and about learning fresh who you really are.

Garden Spells is Sarah Addison Allen's first novel, and is a triumph.  It is the best magic realism novel I've read since finding The Time Traveler's Wife two years ago, and left me holding my breath in anticipation for her sophomore effort.  The book is charming and elegant, like the Southern ladies it depicts.  Allen's attention to detail is inviting, leaving no taste or smell unrepresented.  I haven't felt this welcome in a book in ages, and it genuinely moved me to tears on more than one occasion (part of that could be the incredible connection I felt to Claire, sharing many of her fears).

This book was utterly enchanting, and will likely be the most lovely book I read this year (as sad as that is, considering that there are 360 of reading ahead).  I wasn't left sad at the end of the last page, as I often am after the end of a good book.  Rather, I felt lighter, and liberated.  I look forward to reading this book again, when I have need of a smile and the warmth of something sweet and familiar.

***** of *****

5 out of 5

Thursday Picks

Currently. . .

Reading: Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen

Watching: Grey's Anatomy - Season Two

Hearing: Song About Girls by Will.i.am

I Love You, Beth Cooper

I Love You, Beth Cooper by Larry Doyle

At that moment, Denis realized he hadn't planned for his plan to lead to conversation. Violence, sex, either way he had a plan (both defensive). But chitchat.

So Henneman must've given you major shit.

RESPOND

"Some shit," Denis responded, with simulated indifference. "Little shit. A modicum of excreta."

I know I promised you hard-hitting, occasionally nasty reviews, but I simply cannot do that in this case, because I just really loved this book.

One of the most overused, yet often truest, slogans in the writing world is to "write what you know."  It's sort of a misleading phrase, because all too often people connect it to the old saying "I know what I like, and I like what I know." which results in many writers penning what they like rather than what they know.  In the case of I Love You, Beth Cooper it becomes difficult to determine if Larry Doyle is lacquering a thick veneer of comedy over his own uncomfortable adolescence, or whether it is that the author just knows a hell of a lot about the teen comedy film genre.

Because what you end up thinking more often than not while reading this book is that you are reading an incredibly detailed and lovingly crafted movie script.  Indeed, the book is so much like a movie it is hard to believe that Doyle didn't write it with a film version already in mind (to his credit, Larry Doyle's previous writing credits include episodes of the Simpsons, and the clever teen commentary animation. . . MTV's Daria).  Doyle is well aware of the book's influences, opening each chapter with a topical quote from dozens of teen comedies from The Breakfast Club to Clueless.

The book opens on the humid graduation ceremony of a small town high school that could have been in any John Hughes movie.  It is there that we meet our hero, the meek and sweaty valedictorian Denis ("a vertical stroke from penis") Cooverman.  Denis is not cool.  Denis is not popular.  And though Denis is smart, he could use a pretty big dose of common sense and real life experience.  He decides, mid-speech, to tell his fellow classmates that this would be the ideal time in their life to say everything they have been meaning to say, whether it is to confess their secret sexuality (a pointed comment to his flamboyant best friend Rich "Dick" Munsch) or about eating disorders or abuses.  Everything Denis says at this point makes his classmates both uncomfortable and in some cases violently vengeful.  And then Denis discloses his biggest secret with the titular confession.

Beth Cooper, the beautiful head cheerleader, has sat in front of Denis in almost every class since they were children, and has two memories of him.  One involves an open fly in math class, and the other involves his book-opening confession.

What follows is a hilarious, outrageous, often violent, mostly unbelievable series of events.  In his quest to prove himself to the girl of his dreams I Love You, Beth Cooper takes Denis through a several death threats from Beth's coke-fiend Army boyfriend, to crashing the biggest grad party ever, to a shower rendezvous in the abandoned high school.  In the end, Denis has not only gained more knowledge of Beth Cooper, but he has learned more about himself than he ever could have imagined.  

Doyle's writing is not particularly transcendent.   It is easy to read, and suits to the tone and content of the story, though, so it's difficult to find fault with.  The book taps in to Doyle's animated past by including a chapter-by-chapter depiction of Denis's devolving physical condition, as well a smattering of drawings that guide the story along.  The supporting cast of characters, particularly the is-he-or-isn't-he gay Rich and the chubby, dumb, slutty but well intentioned Treece are everything one could ask for in movie sidekicks, written down and put inside the best movie I've read all year.  

While it includes far too many pop culture references to remain culturally relevant to generations to come, I think it will have the same feeling of fun to it in twenty years as we feel by watching Pretty in Pink decades later.  The clothes are awful, but it still tells us something familiar, something true.  And so does I Love You, Beth Cooper.

**** of *****

4 out of 5